Friday, August 27, 2010

Korean artist Kim Joon takes body art to a whole new level using his subjects as a creative, sprawling, slightly flawed (hey, we’re only human) canvas on which to create hi vibrant, colourful, and dynamic artworks.

Saturday, August 21, 2010

A European Union ban on seal products was temporarily suspended Thursday, the day before it was set to take effect, because of a legal challenge by Inuit leaders.

The Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, representing Canada's 53,000 Inuit, and Inuit in Greenland filed a legal challenge against the EU's ban earlier this year, calling it illegal and immoral.

The Canadian Seal Marketing Group and the Fur Institute of Canada are also involved in the challenge.

Before news of the injunction emerged, Prime Minister Stephen Harper spoke out against the scheduled ban, saying the federal government is "very strongly in opposition" to it.

Harper said it's "flagrant discrimination" against the Canadian sealing industry, which he described as a sector that employs "hard-working people who are also of modest means."

"It is a disgrace that they're treated this way in some countries based upon no facts or information whatsoever. So, we strongly object to the decision," Harper told reporters at a government announcement in Miramichi, N.B.

Last November, Canada made an official complaint to the World Trade Organization about the European ban. Norway has joined that complaint.

While the U.S. and Canada have large economies, their respective debt-to-GDP ratios are 93% and 62%. The U.S. gets most of the attention because of the size of the numbers that comprise the ratio - $13.5 trillion debt (June 2009) and $14.4 trillion GDP (2009 estimate).

By comparison, China and India have ratios of 7% and 20% respectively. Their economic growth rates have also exceeded the western nations over the past few years, thereby keeping their debt ratios relatively low. If the western nations don't implement policies to reduce their debts, they run the risk of jeopardizing future economic growth and prosperity.

The artist was chosen by a national selection committee comprised of senior contemporary art curators from across Canada and formed by the National Gallery of Canada (NGC), organizer of the Canadian representation for the 2011 Biennale.

Ontario's plunge into online gaming is no gamble - the house will win. Not as lucky are the online competition, legal and illegal, and the thousands of Ontario citizens with a gambling problem, though safeguards are promised.

Sherwood found good deaths at Canuck Place in south Vancouver, the first free-standing pediatric hospice in North America, where he worked from 1995 to 2001 with chronically ill and dying children. That meant managing their pain, along with their angst, their fears, their questions . . . like what happens next?

“I found if you treat them the way you treat anyone else, then they know they’re not dead yet. There can be a lot of laughs in those final days, even when you’re feeling sadness.”

Sherwood found his strength was dealing with death honestly, taking time to listen and ask the right questions — like how are you feeling, what are you thinking or frightened about?

“Dying isn’t just about the physical stuff, it’s about the heart, the spirit. Most patients will tell you that nobody talks to them about the dying process and what to expect. They’re in a place where they feel so alone.

“I go to those dark places with them. I can’t understand what they’re going through — nobody can die for you — but being able to listen to them means somebody cares.”

Comparing Toronto to New York ... is just plain silly; no city comes out of that match-up well ... But take it down a notch to, say, Vancouver and Montreal, and you’ve got a real complaint.

Why? Well, for starters, both cities are smaller, less wealthy, less endowed with “world renowned” art venues — love them or hate them, no building in Canada touches the ROM or the AGO’s shiny renos for sheer architectural chutzpah — but are nonetheless much more established on the international art map.

It doesn’t take a genius to understand why this would be. Buildings are just bricks and glass (and titanium). But it’s what happens inside them divines a local culture’s path.

Saturday, August 7, 2010

A woman who admits she faked having cancer for a charity scam has turned herself in, police say.

A Star investigation revealed that Kirilow shaved her head, plucked her eyebrows and eyelashes to make herself look like a chemotherapy patient. The ruse included attending charity events in her honour, taking cancer research donations from hundreds of people and accepting a flight to Disney World from a legitimate Toronto-based cancer-awareness organization.

Tuesday, August 3, 2010

Riedel waded into the Humber River on Sunday afternoon and balanced rocks for four hours, with a crowd of about 30 watching on shore. He made 30 formations, each within 10 minutes. Some have the look of an inukshuk; another looks remarkably like an egret that visits the river.

Monday, August 2, 2010

Saudi Arabia to join Emirates in blocking RIM’s data network because of potential terrorist use

The decision could prevent hundreds of thousands of users in the Mideast country from accessing email and the web on the handsets starting in October, putting the federation’s reputation as a business-friendly commercial and tourism hub at risk.

BlackBerry data is encrypted and routed overseas, and the measure could be motivated in part by government fears that the messaging system might be exploited by terrorists or other criminals who cannot be monitored by the local authorities.

However, analysts and activists also see it as an attempt to more tightly control the flow of information in the conservative country.

Nineteen-year-old Rajni had been a bride for only a few minutes when her husband, Sanjeev, suggested they head for a nearby police station to ask for protection.

It was only a matter of time, Sanjeev reminded his new wife, before her family started to hunt them down.

In February, after she told her family of her plans to marry Sanjeev, a 24-year-old milkman, Rajni's uncle grabbed her around the neck, slapped her, and threatened to kill her.

The couple was a mismatch, Rajni's uncle raged. Her father, after all, has 25 buffalo, wealthy in this lush stretch of India, a checkerboard of rice paddy and sugar cane fields. Sanjeev and his parents, on the other hand, were labourers who made $2 a day.

If she married Sanjeev, her uncle said, Rajni's family would be forced to kill both of them to preserve its honour.

Sanjeev and Rajni are hardly unique. Throughout northern India, young couples are being killed by the thousands in the name of honour and tradition. Some are poisoned, while others are hanged, drowned or beheaded.

In one recent case, a young woman was reportedly lit on fire and burned to death for marrying the wrong man in a village just outside New Delhi.

There are at least 900 so-called “honour killings” a year in the Indian states of Haryana, Punjab and Uttar Pradesh, according to a study cited by Human Rights Watch, and there has even been a string of such murders in the country's affluent capital in recent weeks.

Sunday, August 1, 2010

Officials with the federal ministry have banned a series of gag luggage decals that depict realistic images of suitcases stuffed with U.S. greenbacks, bags of cocaine, sex toys and even a bound and gagged flight attendant.